Rodriguez: Remembering fellow brain cancer patient Michael Weiner
From SABR member Juan C. Rodriguez at the South Florida Sun-Sentinel on November 21, 2013:
The Marlins eventually came up, but the visit wasn’t professional. It was personal.
I asked plenty of questions during my one-on-one with Michael Weiner last April. The tape recorder wasn’t on and I wasn’t scribbling answers as we chatted in his office at the Major League Baseball Players’ Association in New York.
Not that I wasn’t interested in Weiner’s take on any number of baseball-related matters. He was the head of the players’ union. The conversation remained on point. Two relatively young guys – me 40 and Weiner about 10 years older – comparing notes on brain cancer.
Upon hearing the news of Weiner’s passing Thursday after his 15-month fight, I was reminded of our meeting on that April afternoon before heading to Citi Field. About a week after I underwent my craniotomy in Nashville last December I heard from Weiner. I was sitting in the captain’s chair of a rented minivan, somewhere between Nashville and Atlanta, on our way back home. Residual swelling precluded me from flying.
Weiner left me a voicemail, wishing me well and offering to provide whatever insight he could into the journey ahead. Over the next couple of months we exchanged emails and spoke on the phone a few times. Our cases were similar in that we were both diagnosed with stage 4 GBM (glioblastoma multiforme), the most common and aggressive form of primary malignant brain tumors. The prognosis in most cases is about a year.
Read the full article here: http://www.sun-sentinel.com/sports/miami-marlins/marlins-blog/sfl-michael-weiner-blog-20131122,0,5516269.story
Originally published: November 22, 2013. Last Updated: November 22, 2013.